1) Education. Seeks to inform seekers as to what is happening between Palestinians and Israelis, issues and personalities and positions
2) Advocacy. Urges seekers to share information with their world, advocate with political figures, locally, regionally, nationally
3) Action. Uges support of those institutions, agencies, persons and entities who are working toward addressing the problems, working toward reconciliation and shalom/salaam/peace.

Friday, November 2, 2007

In Humanity Lies Hope For PeaceBy Hilla MedaliaIn The Boston Globe,Opinion November 1, 2007 http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/11/01/in_humanity_lies_hope_foDELEGATES FROM Israel and a consortium of Arab states will meet in the United States this month with the hope of devising an agreement - or at least the DNA of an agreement - that will lead to the formation of a Palestinian state and, theoretically, stability in the Middle East. It is the first such US-led summit in years, and regardless of the outcome, it will be a historic event.

History, unfortunately, has not favored success when it comes to peace between Israel and the Palestinians. The road to peace is littered with numerous failed plans that have left in their wake a sea of bitter cynicism, and a resignation that this is a road that will forever stretch beyond the horizon. One can't be blamed for believing this summit will be no different.

The cynicism is understandable, but perhaps this is because, in both the United States and Middle East, much of what we know, or what we think we know, about the conflict is filtered through the lens of politics, which is too often framed by zealots and violence.

This leads both sides to assume that the general population of the other shares these extremist beliefs and desires nothing less than their complete subjugation, if not annihilation. At the very least, the average citizen's voice is overwhelmed by the deafening power of extremism. If you set aside the political rhetoric, however, and listen to what the average Israeli or Palestinian truly wants, you'll find that their desires are not so different. Opportunities for such dialogue, unfortunately, are rare.

I grew up in Ramat Hasharon, Israel, no more than 16 miles from Tulkarm, a Palestinian refugee camp, but until three years ago, I had never set foot in one of the camps that are the crux of the hostilities. The closest most Israelis - other than the army - get to Palestinian life is what they see in the media, which focuses almost exclusively on military activity and civil unrest.

I entered one of these camps, Deheisheh, not with a machine gun, but with a camera, to film a documentary about the mothers of two teenage girls: Rachel Levy, an Israeli, and Ayat al-Akhras, a Palestinian who killed Rachel, herself, and another bystander, and injured dozens of others in a suicide bombing several years ago. A neutral Christian Palestinian peace worker had to negotiate my entrance into the camp.

Simply bearing witness to life inside Deheisheh was a remarkable education. I was able to see Palestinians not as a political or military entity, but as ordinary people going through their daily routine - shopping, going to school, coming home from work - albeit in markedly oppressive conditions. The experience was short lived, however, and the political reality of the conflict brought home when we were detained within an hour by the Palestinian Authority and then released back to Israel."

Several weeks later, we arranged a meeting between Rachel's mother, Avigail, and Ayat's mother, Um Samir. Avigail had sought the meeting in an effort to understand why her daughter had become another of the countless victims of the Palestinian terrorist campaign, and what motivated Ayat to feel justified in killing innocent people. The mothers "met" via a videoconference, since a face-to-face meeting had proved impossible.

Their exchange was tense, and understandably, fraught with grief and an array of complex emotions. Both arrived with agendas to uphold and negative assumptions about the other. They could not agree on the morality or immorality of what Ayat had done. But they did understand each other as mothers who were devastated to have lost their daughters.

Most important, after four hours of often circuitous, heated dialogue, neither of them wanted the conversation to end. They stayed as long as the video conference schedule allowed, and then left reluctantly. Regardless of the hostility, they had seen each other in a way that Israelis and Palestinians rarely do - as human beings - and they did not want to let that go. It was too precious.

Herein lies the seed of hope for peace, or perhaps just a seed of hope for hope. When the US, Arab, and Israeli leaders meet at the upcoming summit, they might bear in mind that they are not representing political or military factions, but mothers, daughters, fathers, and sons who yearn to have their humanity recognized.

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Below is an open letter from American Jews for Peace, to the US government (signed by 3,800 American Jews) as published in the New York Times, (get this) on July 17, 2002.

This is sad. It is another example of a simple, rather precise outline of how the conflict can be resolved. And this piece is 5 years old! And its from Amerian Jews!

To whose advantage is this conflict allowed to continue? Where is the Israeli and Palestinian and American leadership to get this done?!

Please copy this letter and send it to President Bush and Secretary Rice, as well as all the Jewish Americans you know, asking them to advocate for this position. It was true in 2002. It is still true in 2007!

Peace in the Middle East:An Open Letter from American Jews to Our Government

In the wake of the recent bloodshed in the Middle East, many Israelis and Palestinians -- and their supporters in the United States -- have reverted to an us-versus-them thinking in which they see themselves as righteous victims and ignore or minimize the injustices they have done, and continue to do, to the other people.

In fact, both the Israeli and Palestinian peoples have suffered great wrongs at the hands of the other, albeit in different and unequal ways; both have legitimate grievances, legitimate fears, and legitimate distrust of the other people's willingness to compromise for the sake of peace.Though the signers of this letter have a wide range of views about the blame for the present situation, we have a common view of what a solution will have to consist of.

Incremental attempts at building trust have reached an impasse. The only alternative to endless war is a comprehensive settlement based on simple but radical principles:Israeli and Palestinian lives are equally precious.

The Israeli and Palestinian peoples have equal rights to national self-determination and to live in peace and security.

The Israeli and Palestinian peoples have equal rights to a fair share of the land and resources of historic Palestine.

Fair-minded people throughout the world have long understood with some precision what a tenable solution, respecting these principles, would entail:

Two national states, Israel and Palestine, with equal sovereignty, equal rights and equal responsibilities.

Partition along the pre-1967 border as modified only by minor mutually agreed territorial swaps.

Israeli evacuation of all settlements in the occupied territories except those within the agreed swapped areas.

Palestinian and Arab recognition of Israel and renunciation of any further territorial claims.Palestinian acceptance of negotiated limitations on the "right of return" in exchange for financial compensation for refugees.

Several years ago, polls showed that majorities of both Israelis and Palestinians were willing to accept a compromise settlement of this kind. Despite the current carnage, that may still be the case; but compromise is difficult when majorities on both sides support provocative military actions that they view as purely defensive, while powerful minorities pursue maximalist territorial aims.

If Israelis and Palestinians are unwilling or unable to negotiate a workable peace, the international community must take the lead in promoting one. This is in the long-term interest not only of Israelis and Palestinians, but also of Americans: recent events have made painfully clear that our own national security is deeply undermined by instability and injustice in the Middle East.

The U.S. bears a special responsibility for the current tragic impasse, by virtue of our massive economic and military support for the Israeli government: $500 per Israeli citizen per year. Our country has an extraordinary leverage on Israeli policy, if only our government would dare to use it. As American Jews who care deeply about the long-term security of Israel, we call on our government to make continued aid conditional on Israeli acceptance of an internationally agreed two-state settlement.

Rejectionists on both sides will of course attack any such settlement. Foreign troops may well be required to enforce it, and they must be prepared to accept casualties. One may nevertheless hope that majorities of both Israelis and Palestinians will realize that an imperfect peace is preferable to endless war.

There is no guarantee that this approach will work; but it is virtually guaranteed that all alternatives will fail.

A prominent Orthodox rabbi has broken a taboo by publicly advocating that his community consider a possible division of Jerusalem to achieve a lasting peace with the Palestinians.

Rabbi Yosef Kanefsky of B’nai David Judea wrote in Friday’s Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles that the “worst-case scenario” of returning the Western Wall and the Temple Mount to Arab control would be horrifying and unfathomable to him.

“At the same time, though, to insist that the [Israeli] government not talk about Jerusalem at all (including, the possibility, for example, of Palestinian sovereignty over Arab neighborhoods) is to insist that Israel come to the negotiating table telling a dishonest story -- a story in which our side has made no mistakes and no miscalculations, a story in which there is no moral ambiguity in the way we have chosen to rule people we conquered, a story in which we don’t owe anything to anyone,” Kanefsky wrote.

The 44-year old rabbi occasionally has startled Orthodox circles with his innovative ideas, but he enjoys wide respect among his peers in other denominations, who elected him to a term as president of the Southern California Board of Rabbis.

Kanefsky predicts that no peace conference will succeed until Israelis and Palestinians accept honest versions of their conflict and admit their mistakes over the past 40 years, including the occupation of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank after the Six-Day War in 1967.

He acknowledges that the slogan “Jerusalem: Israel’s Eternally Undivided Capital” is treated with “biblical reverence by my community," adding that it is "a corollary to the belief in the coming of the Messiah.”

It is because of the unquestioned acceptance of this slogan by the Orthodox, as well as Christian evangelists, that he decided to initiate “a conversation that desperately needs to begin,” Kanefsky wrote.

Within hours of the opinion piece’s publication, reactions began to pour in to the Jewish Journal. Editor-in-Chief Rob Eshman said he received more than 100 letters, e-mails and phone calls about the article, along with a number of op-ed rebuttals.

On Saturday, the Los Angeles Times reported on Kanefsky’s article as the lead story in its California state section, along with local and national reactions.

The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, the community’s umbrella organization, is drafting a statement on the article. However, its Web site said “the Orthodox Union is preparing a comprehensive action plan which will call upon members of our community to join on the walls of Jerusalem and become her defenders against those who would divide her.”

Rabbi Pesach Lerner, executive vice president of the National Council of Young Israel, denounced the article, telling the Los Angeles Times that “Rabbi Kanefsky is completely off-base. I think his call for this discussion is ridiculous. It would amount to religious suicide.”

A Conservative Los Angeles rabbi, David Wolpe, also disagreed with Kanefsky’s viewpoint.“To give up Jerusalem to people who want to destroy your country is an emotional high jump you’d have to be better than an Olympic athlete to vault,” Wolpe said.

However, another prominent Conservative rabbi, Harold Schulweis, applauded Kanefsky’s courage “to touch the third rail, which this is. It is a mark of courage and conscience.”

Reform Rabbi Laura Geller also praised Kanefsky as “a visionary leader” and hoped his article would lead to a thoughtful debate.

Sunday, October 28, 2007

WHENEVER I am asked if I am optimistic about an end to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, I say that I am not. Optimism requires clear signs that things are changing - meaningful words and unambiguous actions that point to real progress. I do not yet hear enough meaningful words, nor do I yet see enough unambiguous deeds to justify optimism.

However, that does not mean I am without hope. I am a Christian. I am constrained by my faith to hope against hope, placing my trust in things as yet unseen. Hope persists in the face of evidence to the contrary, undeterred by setbacks and disappointment. Hoping against hope, then, I do believe that a resolution will be found. It will not be perfect, but it can be just; and if it is just, it will usher in a future of peace.

My hope for peace is not amorphous. It has a shape. It is not the shape of a particular political solution, although there are some political solutions that I believe to be more just than others.Neither does my hope take the shape of a particular people, although I have pleaded tirelessly for international attention to be paid to the misery of Palestinians, and I have roundly condemned the injustices of certain Israeli policies that compound that misery. Thus I am often accused of siding with Palestinians against Israeli Jews, naively exonerating the one and unfairly demonizing the other.

Nevertheless, I insist that the hope in which I persist is not reducible to politics or identified with a people. It has a more encompassing shape. I like to call it "God's dream."

God has a dream for all his children. It is about a day when all people enjoy fundamental security and live free of fear. It is about a day when all people have a hospitable land in which to establish a future. More than anything else, God's dream is about a day when all people are accorded equal dignity because they are human beings. In God's beautiful dream, no other reason is required.

God's dream begins when we begin to know each other differently, as bearers of a common humanity, not as statistics to be counted, problems to be solved, enemies to be vanquished or animals to be caged. God's dream begins the moment one adversary looks another in the eye and sees himself reflected there.

All things become possible when hearts fixed in mutual contempt begin to grasp a transforming truth; namely, that this person I fear and despise is not an alien, something less than human. This person is very much like me, and enjoys and suffers, loves and fears, wonders, worries, and hopes. Just as I do, this person longs for well-being in a world of peace.

God's dream begins with this mutual recognition - we are not strangers, we are kin. It culminates in the defeat of oppression perpetrated in the name of security, and of violence inflicted in the name of liberation. God's dream routs the cynicism and despair that once cleared the path for hate to have its corrosive way with us, and for ravenous violence to devour everything in sight.

God's dream comes to flower when everyone who claims to be wholly innocent relinquishes that illusion, when everyone who places absolute blame on another renounces that lie, and when differing stories are told at last as one shared story of human aspiration. God's dream ends in healing and reconciliation. Its finest fruit is human wholeness flourishing in a moral universe.

In the meanwhile, between the root of human solidarity and the fruit of human wholeness, there is the hard work of telling the truth.

From my experience in South Africa I know that truth-telling is hard. It has grave consequences for one's life and reputation. It stretches one's faith, tests one's capacity to love, and pushes hope to the limit. At times, the difficulty of this work can make you wonder if people are right about you, that you are a fool.

No one takes up this work on a do-gooder's whim. It is not a choice. One feels compelled into it. Neither is it work for a little while, but rather for a lifetime - and for more than a lifetime. It is a project bigger than any one life. This long view is a source of encouragement and perseverance. The knowledge that the work preceded us and will go on after us is a fountain of deep gladness that no circumstance can alter."

God's dream begins when we begin to know each other differently, as bearers of a common humanity, not as statistics to be counted, problems to be solved, enemies to be vanquished or animals to be caged. God's dream begins the moment one adversary looks another in the eye and sees himself reflected there.

All things become possible when hearts fixed in mutual contempt begin to grasp a transforming truth; namely, that this person I fear and despise is not an alien, something less than human. This person is very much like me, and enjoys and suffers, loves and fears, wonders, worries, and hopes. Just as I do, this person longs for well-being in a world of peace.

God's dream begins with this mutual recognition - we are not strangers, we are kin. It culminates in the defeat of oppression perpetrated in the name of security, and of violence inflicted in the name of liberation. God's dream routs the cynicism and despair that once cleared the path for hate to have its corrosive way with us, and for ravenous violence to devour everything in sight.

God's dream comes to flower when everyone who claims to be wholly innocent relinquishes that illusion, when everyone who places absolute blame on another renounces that lie, and when differing stories are told at last as one shared story of human aspiration. God's dream ends in healing and reconciliation. Its finest fruit is human wholeness flourishing in a moral universe.In the meanwhile, between the root of human solidarity and the fruit of human wholeness, there is the hard work of telling the truth.

From my experience in South Africa I know that truth-telling is hard. It has grave consequences for one's life and reputation. It stretches one's faith, tests one's capacity to love, and pushes hope to the limit. At times, the difficulty of this work can make you wonder if people are right about you, that you are a fool.

No one takes up this work on a do-gooder's whim. It is not a choice. One feels compelled into it. Neither is it work for a little while, but rather for a lifetime - and for more than a lifetime. It is a project bigger than any one life. This long view is a source of encouragement and perseverance. The knowledge that the work preceded us and will go on after us is a fountain of deep gladness that no circumstance can alter.

\n\u003cp\>Nothing, however, diminishes the fear and trembling that accompany speaking the truth to power in love. An acute awareness of fallibility is a constant companion in this task, but because nothing is more important in the current situation than to speak as truthfully as one can, there can be no shrinking from testifying to what one sees and hears.

What do I see and hear in the Holy Land? Some people cannot move freely from one place to another. A wall separates them from their families and from their incomes. They cannot tend to their gardens at home or to their lessons at school. They are arbitrarily demeaned at checkpoints and unnecessarily beleaguered by capricious applications of bureaucratic red tape. I grieve for the damage being done daily to people's souls and bodies. I have to tell the truth: I am reminded of the yoke of oppression that was once our burden in South Africa.

I see and hear that ancient olive trees are uprooted. Flocks are cut off from their pastures and shepherds. The homes of some people are bulldozed even as new homes for others are illegally constructed on other people's land. I grieve for the land that suffers such violence, the marring of its beauty, the loss of its comforts, the despoiling of its yield. I have to tell the truth: I am reminded of the bitter days of uprooting and despoiling in my own country.

I see and hear that young people believe that it is heroic and pious to kill others by killing themselves. They strap bombs to their torsos to achieve liberation. They do not know that liberation achieved by brutality will defraud in the end. I grieve the waste of their lives and of the lives they take, the loss of personal and communal security they cause, and the lust for revenge that follows their crimes, crowding out all reason and restraint. I have to tell the truth: I am reminded of the explosive anger that inflamed South Africa, too.

Some people are enraged by comparisons between the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and what happened in South Africa. There are differences between the two situations, but a comparison need not be exact in every feature to yield clarity about what is going on. Moreover, for those of us who lived through the dehumanizing horrors of the apartheid era, the comparison seems not only apt, it is also necessary. It is necessary if we are to persevere in our hope that things can change."

Nothing, however, diminishes the fear and trembling that accompany speaking the truth to power in love. An acute awareness of fallibility is a constant companion in this task, but because nothing is more important in the current situation than to speak as truthfully as one can, there can be no shrinking from testifying to what one sees and hears.

What do I see and hear in the Holy Land? Some people cannot move freely from one place to another. A wall separates them from their families and from their incomes. They cannot tend to their gardens at home or to their lessons at school. They are arbitrarily demeaned at checkpoints and unnecessarily beleaguered by capricious applications of bureaucratic red tape. I grieve for the damage being done daily to people's souls and bodies. I have to tell the truth: I am reminded of the yoke of oppression that was once our burden in South Africa.

I see and hear that ancient olive trees are uprooted. Flocks are cut off from their pastures and shepherds. The homes of some people are bulldozed even as new homes for others are illegally constructed on other people's land. I grieve for the land that suffers such violence, the marring of its beauty, the loss of its comforts, the despoiling of its yield. I have to tell the truth: I am reminded of the bitter days of uprooting and despoiling in my own country.

I see and hear that young people believe that it is heroic and pious to kill others by killing themselves. They strap bombs to their torsos to achieve liberation. They do not know that liberation achieved by brutality will defraud in the end. I grieve the waste of their lives and of the lives they take, the loss of personal and communal security they cause, and the lust for revenge that follows their crimes, crowding out all reason and restraint. I have to tell the truth: I am reminded of the explosive anger that inflamed South Africa, too.

Some people are enraged by comparisons between the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and what happened in South Africa. There are differences between the two situations, but a comparison need not be exact in every feature to yield clarity about what is going on. Moreover, for those of us who lived through the dehumanizing horrors of the apartheid era, the comparison seems not only apt, it is also necessary. It is necessary if we are to persevere in our hope that things can change.

Indeed, because of what I experienced in South Africa, I harbor a vast, unreasoning hope for Israel and the Palestinian territories. South Africans, after all, had no reason to suppose that the evil system and the cycles of violence that were sapping the soul of our nation would ever change. There was nothing special or different about South Africans to deserve the appearance of the very thing for which we prayed and worked and suffered so long.

Most South Africans did not believe they would live to see a day of liberation. They did not believe that their children's children would see it. They did not believe that such a day even existed, except in fantasy. But we have seen it. We are living now in the day we longed for.

It is not a cloudless day. The divine arc that bends toward a truly just and whole society has not yet stretched fully across my country's sky like a rainbow of peace. It is not finished, it does not always live up to its promise, it is not perfect - but it is new. A brand new thing, like a dream of God, has come about to replace the old story of mutual hatred and oppression.

I have seen it and heard it, and so to this truth, too, I am compelled to testify - if it can happen in South Africa, it can happen with the Israelis and Palestinians. There is not much reason to be optimistic, but there is every reason to hope.

Indeed, because of what I experienced in South Africa, I harbor a vast, unreasoning hope for Israel and the Palestinian territories. South Africans, after all, had no reason to suppose that the evil system and the cycles of violence that were sapping the soul of our nation would ever change. There was nothing special or different about South Africans to deserve the appearance of the very thing for which we prayed and worked and suffered so long.

Most South Africans did not believe they would live to see a day of liberation. They did not believe that their children's children would see it. They did not believe that such a day even existed, except in fantasy. But we have seen it. We are living now in the day we longed for.

It is not a cloudless day. The divine arc that bends toward a truly just and whole society has not yet stretched fully across my country's sky like a rainbow of peace. It is not finished, it does not always live up to its promise, it is not perfect - but it is new. A brand new thing, like a dream of God, has come about to replace the old story of mutual hatred and oppression.

I have seen it and heard it, and so to this truth, too, I am compelled to testify - if it can happen in South Africa, it can happen with the Israelis and Palestinians. There is not much reason to be optimistic, but there is every reason to hope.